Turns out there is a real, scientific reason behind your blinding aversion to Nickelback’s particular brand of rock n’ roll.

The study, which dives into the detestable nature of the Alberta-born band’s music, was published in Metal Music Studies (what, you’ve never heard of this institution? Well, it’s the journal of the International Society for Metal Music Studies) and put together by a student, Salli Anttonen, at the University of Finland.

“The Canadian band Nickelback has faced substantial negative feedback in the media,” the study states. Uh, yeah—everybody be hating on Nickleback. It’s the cool thing to do. The question is why.

By analyzing reviews in the Finnish media from 2000-2014, Anttonen came to the conclusion that “Traditional discourses of authenticity are widely present in the critical reception, valuing uncommercialism, subversiveness, correspondence of art and persona, originality and truth in particular.”

All this to say that Nickelback is doing anything but the original, and that is no way to win over music critics. Or, we might add, fans—even Canadian fans with their wonderfully sunny dispositions.

It seems that the world is picking up on Nickelback’s inauthenticity and not having any of it.

We’re not sure if we really needed this validation, but there it is…Nickelback officially sucks.